There seems to be "debate" on religions going on. Most people seems to be mostly against it, but I thought it would be fun to come up with an idea I think could work. I don't really expect this to be part of the game at any points, but if I inspire something, that would just be great. Here it is. I do not actually believe religion needs to be in the game, but why not have fun theorizing?
A new species creation screen based around religions. You add here, from a mix of preset religions (including major Earth religions), the religions that are influential in your population. The maximum should be 6 or something. In addition, you would be able to create your religion(s). Each religion would have a number of "religious tenets" that is what is important in the religion. These traits could range would be anything related to religions, for example "doomsday", "meditation", "sacrifice" "heaven" and "priesthood". Either they would all have positives and negatives, or there could be some kind of point-buy system. I'd say a maximum of five, six or seven feats, depending on how it is balanced. What they worship is not what would be important, it is how they worship them, and what affects the lives of people. Some traits would be restricted by ethos.
Fanatic spiritualists will always have a religion, spiritualists almost always, neutrals sometimes, materialists uncommonly, and fanatic materialists would never worship anything. Spiritualist empires would always have to pick at least one religion at the start of the game, while fanatic materialists cannot choose any. The starting religions would be distributed as equally as possible between the pops, hopefully with a way to favor some religions over others. A religion without followers would not vanish, as minorities still worship them. The could return if pops turn spiritualist or if anything religions' influence wanes over a pop. Non-believers could gain a small boost to science, while spiritualists' happiness modifier would be replaced with a religion-spread modifier. This way it is probably mostly balanced. Fanatic spiritualists should also be hard to convert. In addition, xenophobes would be much less inclined to adopt alien beliefs, with the opposite being true for xenophiles.
Missionaries would be absent from the game, and religions would spread through pops' influence alone. Policies, treaties and possibly buildings could be quite influential on this. Some traits would favor/disfavor spread to other races. When new religions are founded (not sure when this would happen), either a random religion is chosen, or the player get to choose one, or the player get to create one (or choose one if he so wish). There should probably be a separate list for this one, so you don't see Christianity probably popping up when it shouldn't.
To describe the list of religions better, this is how they would work in the case of AIs. Here, there are three options:
1. Each religion is set to which phenotypes can gain them, any restrictions by ethos is included, and also they are set to whether they are included from the start or if restricted to/from being founded later in the game. If no phenotype can gain them, only players might choose them. It would be a lot of work to gain a wide variety, but less weird names?
2. The AI religions (and yours if you want) would have randomized tenets, and a random name tied to the race name lists.
3. A combination of the two, with premade religions working like premade races; you may set them to spawn always (if you want to see a religion), sometimes or never.
The pros of this system are:
- Roleplaying potential, for those who want their actual religion(s) to matter.
- Many different types of religions.
- Many religious scenarios at start (one religion, many religions, no religions, major/minor religion, etc).
- New religions through the game.
- Atheism is not a religion.
- Not too much micromanagement, while players can still affect them.
- Not too human-centric.
The cons are:
- Not truly needed. The base game includes faith to the degree a space grand strategy game should. These would suit better to mods or optional DLCs.
- Lots of work to create.
- Lots of work to balance.
- Would not be good for gameplay. It is pretty hard to make a meaningful religions system that is both controllable and realistic.
Examples:
The Blorg Commonality has three religions, with some pops being irreligious due to being neutral on the spiritual/materialist ethos scale. The first, known as Friendism has these ethos, the second, known as Blorgism, has these ethos, and the third, known as the Church of Friendship, has these ethos.
The Widereth States is fanatic materialist, and has no religions.
Important
Thus, I conclude that this is the best system I can think of. As I said, more of an idea for a mod than being part of the game. Although I think this could lay the groundwork for an amazing DLC. I'd love if people actually gave me criticism based on my idea, rather than on whether religions should be in the game or not. We have a completely other thread for that.
A new species creation screen based around religions. You add here, from a mix of preset religions (including major Earth religions), the religions that are influential in your population. The maximum should be 6 or something. In addition, you would be able to create your religion(s). Each religion would have a number of "religious tenets" that is what is important in the religion. These traits could range would be anything related to religions, for example "doomsday", "meditation", "sacrifice" "heaven" and "priesthood". Either they would all have positives and negatives, or there could be some kind of point-buy system. I'd say a maximum of five, six or seven feats, depending on how it is balanced. What they worship is not what would be important, it is how they worship them, and what affects the lives of people. Some traits would be restricted by ethos.
Fanatic spiritualists will always have a religion, spiritualists almost always, neutrals sometimes, materialists uncommonly, and fanatic materialists would never worship anything. Spiritualist empires would always have to pick at least one religion at the start of the game, while fanatic materialists cannot choose any. The starting religions would be distributed as equally as possible between the pops, hopefully with a way to favor some religions over others. A religion without followers would not vanish, as minorities still worship them. The could return if pops turn spiritualist or if anything religions' influence wanes over a pop. Non-believers could gain a small boost to science, while spiritualists' happiness modifier would be replaced with a religion-spread modifier. This way it is probably mostly balanced. Fanatic spiritualists should also be hard to convert. In addition, xenophobes would be much less inclined to adopt alien beliefs, with the opposite being true for xenophiles.
Missionaries would be absent from the game, and religions would spread through pops' influence alone. Policies, treaties and possibly buildings could be quite influential on this. Some traits would favor/disfavor spread to other races. When new religions are founded (not sure when this would happen), either a random religion is chosen, or the player get to choose one, or the player get to create one (or choose one if he so wish). There should probably be a separate list for this one, so you don't see Christianity probably popping up when it shouldn't.
To describe the list of religions better, this is how they would work in the case of AIs. Here, there are three options:
1. Each religion is set to which phenotypes can gain them, any restrictions by ethos is included, and also they are set to whether they are included from the start or if restricted to/from being founded later in the game. If no phenotype can gain them, only players might choose them. It would be a lot of work to gain a wide variety, but less weird names?
2. The AI religions (and yours if you want) would have randomized tenets, and a random name tied to the race name lists.
3. A combination of the two, with premade religions working like premade races; you may set them to spawn always (if you want to see a religion), sometimes or never.
The pros of this system are:
- Roleplaying potential, for those who want their actual religion(s) to matter.
- Many different types of religions.
- Many religious scenarios at start (one religion, many religions, no religions, major/minor religion, etc).
- New religions through the game.
- Atheism is not a religion.
- Not too much micromanagement, while players can still affect them.
- Not too human-centric.
The cons are:
- Not truly needed. The base game includes faith to the degree a space grand strategy game should. These would suit better to mods or optional DLCs.
- Lots of work to create.
- Lots of work to balance.
- Would not be good for gameplay. It is pretty hard to make a meaningful religions system that is both controllable and realistic.
Examples:
The Blorg Commonality has three religions, with some pops being irreligious due to being neutral on the spiritual/materialist ethos scale. The first, known as Friendism has these ethos, the second, known as Blorgism, has these ethos, and the third, known as the Church of Friendship, has these ethos.
The Widereth States is fanatic materialist, and has no religions.
Important
Thus, I conclude that this is the best system I can think of. As I said, more of an idea for a mod than being part of the game. Although I think this could lay the groundwork for an amazing DLC. I'd love if people actually gave me criticism based on my idea, rather than on whether religions should be in the game or not. We have a completely other thread for that.
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